What Now, Soldier?
by VogueWriters
Summary: OFC x Bucky. Slow burn. Heavy scifi. Matilda was used to running solo, would another soldier teach her how to trust? Will update if there is interest, extremely self indulgent


The auditorium was breathless with excitement as the CEO of Intel, the worlds largest producers of computer processors, took the centre stage. A huge announcement had been promised, and the behemoth of the hardware industry rarely disappointed in regard to innovation.

The speaker easily entertained the rapt audience, cracking inoffensive jokes to break the heady tension of enthusiasm, all while easily building the grandness of the news to come. Matilda noted his earnest look with a quiet grin – she already knew what was to occur, and the public reaction would most certainly be spectacular.

Most of the faces surrounding her, lit with the bright blue of the Intel logo beaming from the widescreen behind the speaker, were recognisable from technical shows and Forbes covers. The Gates, the Cooks, the Buffets. Even the famous Stark had made an appearance to Matilda's surprise – the political intrigue and conflict surrounding him after his recent disaster of Accords made him an easy target. Not that he appeared to be in any danger, she was not so naïve to assume that the glowing blue case he held was for aesthetics alone.

Her hazel eyes were lazily drawn back to the stage. The CEO was reaching the apex of his speech, she could see the sweat forming on his brow. Their relationship was limited to business necessity, but from her brief interactions she liked his vision, his determination. That opinion may well have been influenced by the 150 million currently sitting in her bank account, however.

"And so, it is my pleasure to introduce the next stage of computing, the defining processor of our generation…" a sweeping gesture to the screen behind him as the image changed, "the first ever, Quantum processor"

The audience seemed to gasp as a collective unit, and the speaker had to pause to allow the whoops and cheers to subside. Could it really be that something so novel, so exciting was coming to the consumer market?

Matilda indulged in the reaction, savouring the awe of the room, the taken aback looks and bright eyes. Even Stark, a few seats over from her, let out a low whistle. Although she worked away from the public view, a positive response was always appreciated.

The CEO continued, describing the specifications and information about the famed piece of equipment.

"This processor does not have a Hertz speed, why would it? All bits can exist as both 0 and 1, true and false. The speed and capability it provides is unmatched, and we are excited to announce our partnership with Dell computers…." And now another man joined him on stage, the leader of the Dell corporation. There was jubilant applause as he scaled the small stairs, right hand raised in a polite wave, cheerful grin plastered on his face. Happy, as he should be. They were almost certain to make an obscene amount of money.

Matilda sat patiently through the rest of the presentation, only half paying attention at this stage. Mentally, she was already on to the next project, her next fix. The speakers thanked the lead engineer, a jovial man named Dennis. She didn't mind him either, he was one of the few people she had met that was not entirely motivated by money and had mostly left her alone as she developed the processor. Intel had assured her that her name would be kept out of all patents, marketing and acknowledgments. As far as the world cared to know, Dennis had developed the worlds first quantum computer.

The presentation ended and the attendants milled slowly out of the auditorium, most entranced in conversations with their peers. The world had truly changed on this day for not only the technology community, but the world.

Matilda collected her omnipresent protein shake bottle and joined the procession leaving the room. The dark glasses on her face served as a way to prevent her from being recognised, not that that was a likely event in any case. She had been very careful to keep out of the public spotlight.

Dennis had invited her to the celebratory gathering that was to take place tonight, but she had politely declined. As far as she was concerned, the money was paid and the job was done, there was no need to continue the relationship. Her celebration would take place later on that night, once she had made the drive home and was back in a position of relative safety.

###

Matilda arrived at her apartment not much after the end of the conference. She lived in New York, in a refurbished cotton mill. The loft still had the industrial feel of exposed brick and steel joists, but she loved it. It was perfect for what she did.

And what did she do? Well, mostly freelancing. At this point in time it was purely intellectual pursuits, the latest of which had been the quantum processor. In another life however, this consulting style of work had included more physical pursuits, where she had been a kind of soldier for hire. Not so much an assassin, there were enough of those and many were better than her, but more of an addition to an existing team. Her clients had included the Japanese Yakuza as well as the Russian Mafia, her own ethics fluid enough to sign up to anything with a satisfactorily padded bottom line.

The tap ran as Matilda refilled her shake bottle. She was eating or drinking almost constantly, despite her relatively slender, but toned frame. She needed to consume at least 6000 calories a day, triple the amount of a regular person and significantly more than one might expect of her stature and gender. Almost all of those calories were directed to her brain.

Matilda was not someone who was especially intelligent, or creative, but her mind was far from normal.

Well, her _minds. _

Your average person will have a single plane, or level of consciousness. They are not able to think of multiple things at the same time, rather thoughts are organised in a far more linear pattern. It can become easily overwhelmed, and even multitasking really requires shifting attention quickly between different sources of attention.

Matilda's thoughts worked a bit differently, however.

Instead of a single plane of cohesive thought, she possessed eight. She could consider up to eight concurrent trails of thought at the same time. It is the equivalent of being able to understand eight voices layered on top of each other or being able to read eight books printed directly on top of the other in a single instance.

In a way, designing the quantum computer had been designing her own mind. A conventional processor gives the illusion of running multiple events at the same time, when in reality it is switching between applications at a speed too fast for us to notice. It can only give one process it's attention at one time, not multiple.

A quantum computer allows for true multitasking, when bits can both be a positive and a negative, these processes can truly run simultaneously.

Matilda developed this technology in a sort of collaboration between her planes of thought, like a group of experts discussing a problem. But instead of being limited by the speed of conversation, of mouth movement and waves moving through the air, her only limit was the speed of electrical impulse. Which is hardly a limit at all.

It is this massive awareness that Matilda had leveraged in her more military pursuits. Our eyes can notice a single thing at once and then make a decision based on this information. But she had all the information, all the time. It wasn't a pair of eyes observing a scene, it was a group of individual consciousness making an agreement on all available data. It had become comically easy to outwit the enemy when she viewed them in this way.

Her protein shake was now sufficiently full, and she gulped it eagerly. Her stomach had been complaining loudly the entire way home, energy being expended far too quickly by even driving home. At times, the heightened awareness was overwhelming, but she truly knew no different. She had been born like this.

A sleek desktop sat atop a walnut desk and she sat lightly in front of it. Now that the quantum project had been completed, Matilda began the search for a new contract. Most of her jobs came through word of mouth, either from satisfied customers or repeat purchases. A large portion of her mailbox were military requests, but she largely ignored them. The close-knit nature of them made her more likely to be taken far too much notice of. Anonymity was they key for her.

Her eyes gazed lazily at the screen, one hand cradling a pointed chin and the other sipping from the protein shake. She heard the traffic in the street below, the roar of a plane overhead, the whistle of a train. The appropriate consciousnesses informed her of the make of the cars (a Suzuki Swift and an Alfa Romeo), the flight number of the plane (VX197), and the lateness of the train (C train, 2 minutes and 5 seconds). She continued scrolling.

None were promising so she resigned to her fate, electing to begin terrorising the punching bag in the gym room next door. Physical exertion was the only way she was able to sleep at night, and if she went to bed without her body tired, she tended to stew in her own thoughts.

Soft thumps reverted around the apartment as fabric struck fabric. The punching relaxed her, made her confident in her ability to defend herself, coupled with the two dozen firearms hidden in various places around the apartment, including the one on her person.

Her phone lit up on the desk and she was walking towards it before the tone started. It was an unknown number and she picked up on the first ring.

"Hello?"

"Hello, is this Matilda?"

It was a male voice, American, overly manicured. A thread of consciousness let her know that he was travelling in a car. A Stark car (Ghost model X, only one made).

"Yes"

"Ah yes, Dennis gave me your number, told me you could help with something"

She nodded to herself. Perhaps her search for work wasn't so lost.

"Of course, what are the details"

The man smiled through the phone (his beard scratched against the receiver).

"I was hoping you would say that, can we meet somewhere?"

####

The address she had been given was something of an infamous legend in New York city. The famous Stark tower (or was it now the Avengers tower?) which had hosted a gaping blue hole in the sky not so long ago. It was this memory of terror and violence that clouded Matilda's thoughts as she approached the building. She had already identified five plain clothes security guards across the street, their garish disguises somewhat dulled by her dark glasses.

Stark had advised her to ignore the reception and instead take the lift immediately to the appropriate floor. She sipped her protein shake continuously as she walked towards the elevators, mentally grateful that she had thought to pack a few extra packets.

The lift (a modified Fujitec Viridian Gearless) was plush and flew her directly up to the correct floor, no windows to the outside world to prevent its rider from feeling the nauseating effects of such a brisk ascent (45km/h or thereabouts). In moments the doors where sliding cleanly open, a light ding to announce her arrival.


End file.
